


Tell Your Story

by Crewe



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Mythcarver, semi-sentient weapons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-30
Updated: 2016-11-30
Packaged: 2018-09-03 05:15:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8698480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crewe/pseuds/Crewe
Summary: Mythcarver has known many wielders, and it remembers their stories.Or, Scanlan makes a choice and his Vestige awakens.





	

Mythcarver has known many hands. For longer than memory, hands of all shapes and sizes have wrapped around its narrow handle. Callouses innumerable have worn the grip smooth, and its blade still vibrates with the memory of their joy and fear and triumph and desperation. It still hums with their stories.

  
The last hands that held it were large, inhuman; not a wielder but a collector, who kept it safe and hidden to await whoever fate decreed would take it up.

  
The hands that hold it now are small; rough fingertips and soft palms, the hands of a musician and not a swordsman, but they have steel in their grip.

  
Mythcarver knows its wielders. It listens to the stories told in the beating of their hearts and the rush of their breath. It hears their struggles and their sorrows and it waits and watches until they decide to change their story, and leaps into action to make sure it is told.

  
Its wielder now approaches that decision, in this place where flames reflect off its blade and the heat makes the palm resting on its hilt slick with sweat.

  
And Mythcarver remembers.

  
\--

  
_The story-teller’s hands were rough from work, not swordcraft. They had held a weapon only once before, and they had run from it, back to the safety of the quiet village, where they saw the admiration in the eyes of the children and pretended it didn’t make them feel like a liar._

  
_They found the blade by chance, searching through an old storehouse. Everyone they asked remembered a different story to explain its presence: a courtship gift from a wealthy suitor, long forgotten; stolen from a caravan carrying riches from a far-off continent; given as payment by a lost and starving traveler for food and shelter from the winter._

  
_So they took it, and when they gathered the children on cold nights to tell stories they brought out the sword, and they told them new, grander origins. They spoke about poet-kings defending their lands and heroes who slew monsters with song as much as blade, and Mythcarver flashed and hummed in the warmth and firelight and together they kept the darkness at bay._

  
_When the peace of the village was finally shattered, the story-teller took hold of the blade in their work-calloused hands and didn’t run._

  
_The blade pulsed with the beat of their changed heart, and left history trailing behind every impossibly-fast blow as with its help the story-teller carved out a place for their tale._

  
\--

  
Mythcarver feels the agony of decision in clenched teeth and a tight fist and the pained determination in the harsh footfalls as the reflection of blood in blonde hair gets smaller. It senses the shift in the story as its wielder turns from light to music.

  
And Mythcarver awakens.

  
\--

  
_The seeker’s hands were nimble and covered in scars, remnants of a time when they were not quite quick enough. She gathered stories alongside her treasure, chasing rumors of lost hoards and fabled artifacts across the land with a restless greed and sweeping triumphant into taverns to tell her tales._

  
_She sought the sword in the far reaches of the Stormcrest Mountains, leaving the city with a wink and a wave and returning with the glittering blade held high above her head, firelight reflected off steel and a toothy grin as she launched into her newest and greatest story._

  
_They hunted down secrets together, the seeker and the sword, chasing ever greater feats, closer and closer calls, laughing in the face of failure and reaching always for the next treasure._

  
_One day, the next treasure finds her._

  
_Tall and solid like a mountain against the wind, dark and warm like a summer night, she finds the seeker in the woods. With stars in her eyes, the seeker invites her on her quest; with the sun in her smile, the warrior accepts._

  
_From then on, they search together, sharing glory and dances. They adorn each other with uncovered prizes and the seeker keeps one eye on her love and one on the horizon._

  
_They find a ruby--bright as a heart and about the same size, the seeker holds it high in one hand with Mythcarver in the other._

  
_When they try to leave, they are waiting. With jealous storms in their eyes, the thieves leap to attack. The seeker grips the ruby tighter and joins the fray._

  
_The battle is long, and harder than they are prepared for. Battered and weary, the seeker meets her partner’s eyes and squeezes the gem._

  
_Mythcarver pulses._

  
_She turns and hurls the ruby. As the thieves scramble after it, she cuts down stragglers with the strength of those before her as Mythcarver shakes and cries its war song, and together they make it out to tell their story._

  
\--

  
The shadow of the fiend engulfs them, and the musician’s hands shake entirely separate from the pulses traveling down the blade’s length. Desperate, he grabs the sword with both hands, and spiteful brings it to rest over his belt buckle, one final insult to the monster that threatens him and his.

  
Mythcarver flashes as he thrusts and it turns to a blur as it strikes out faster than the eye can follow. It strikes with the strength and protective determination of the story-teller; with the speed and restless brass of the seeker; with the aid of countless bards before and after them, looking up at the fiend as they did their own foes, each saying the same thing:

  
_Not now._

  
_Not today._

  
_The story isn’t over._

  
The beast falls.

  
The musician drops to his knees, astonished by his own feat. As tears drip down his face and his hands shake with adrenaline, Mythcarver calms, and he can sense those past depart, one step back beyond the veil, ready to be called upon again.

  
Ready to tell their stories.

  
\--

  
_Someday, someone new picks up the blade. And in the moment they make that decision, take that step to a new path, they can feel the hands of a musician on theirs as Mythcarver remembers the father, who chose to keep a promise, and chose to live._

**Author's Note:**

> For something so short this took ages to write... I knew I wanted to do something like this pretty much since Matt described Mythcarver killing the pit fiend, but it took a while to actually get it together.
> 
> Anyways Mythcarver is my favorite Vestige??? Like it's so cool???? I love the idea of a sword that's maybe a little bit sentient but not quite all there. And it was super fun coming with ideas for past bards.


End file.
